of her mouth once more. False teeth and old age made her mouth water constantly. “We need to contact Dana and ask her to come home and fulfill her destiny.”
“How?” Doris demanded, scowling. “How old is she? In her twenties?”
“Yes, twenty-nine.” Wiping her lips, then clutching the damp handkerchief in her thin hand, the elder added, “Dana left the Rosebud Reservation after the murders because both sets of her grandparents were dead. She was crazed with grief. I tried to convince her to come and live with me, but she refused, and disappeared. But I sent out the spirit of the pipe I carry to keep in touch with her. She lives in Ohio right now and teaches first graders at a school near Dayton. It is her way of dealing with her loss of the two people she loved most in the world. Children are nothing but love, and that is where Dana has found refuge…until now.”
“Of course,” Sparrow Hawk muttered, “the murders were a terrible blow to all of us. At first we didn’t know who did it. Over time, we were able to track down the culprits—Rogan and his lead woman, Blue Wolf.” She tightened her right hand into a fist. “I wish I could pray for their deaths. I’d do it.”
Doris gave her Apache friend a gentle smile. “As a ceremonial pipe carrier, you are charged with walking the Red Road with a good heart. None of us can use the pipes we carry for anything but good for all our relations.”
“I know,” Sparrow Hawk growled, opening her pudgy, callused hand. “But I will tell you that, in my heart of hearts, I have dreamed of taking their lives for what they took from the Blue Heron Society and from Dana. It is not right.”
Nodding, Agnes said, “No, it’s not right, and now it is time to right wrongs. But to right them in a way that the Great Mystery would approve of. We cannot lower ourselves to lies, deceit, theft or murder, as others choose to do. As pipe carriers, we are the symbols of all things good about those who walk the sacred Red Road. We are role models.”
“I see a gleam in your eyes, Agnes,” Doris noted, grinning. “What plan have you hatched under that messy hen’s nest of white hair?”
Chuckles echoed throughout the hogan. Indeed, Agnes’s white hair did resemble a tangled nest. With arthritis in her joints, she could no longer braid it, much less comb out all the snarls.
Raising her white eyebrows, Agnes gave a toothy smile. “Hens lay eggs. A nest is rich with ideas.” She blinked her watery eyes. “Besides, the dozen hens in my coop think I am one of them now. They come up to me, clucking in their language, and I talk back to them.”
More chuckles sounded.
Agnes felt the tension in the hogan begin to melt. She didn’t mind making a joke about herself to ease it, and shift attention momentarily from the awful reason why they were gathered here. Humor was most needed in the direst of times.
“We must get Dana to come home,” she stated. “Then I will ask her to retrieve the Storm Pipe from Rogan and his women. This is something she must do. She was in line to receive it.”
Shifting restlessly, Sparrow Hawk said, “But does Dana have the heart to do this, Agnes? Rogan is savage in battle and gives no quarter. If this woman has not been fully trained in the ancient ways, how can she combat him? Instead of facing the deaths of her loved ones, she ran away, and has remained out of touch with you. I don’t find that very courageous.”
“I hear your words, sister.” Agnes looked down at the knotted handkerchief in her hand. “But I helped deliver Dana. She was born on November 17.”
Sparrow Hawk grimaced. “So?”
Doris reached over and patted Sparrow Hawk’s arm. “In case you did not realize it, Rogan was born the exact same day and month as Dana.”
“Oh.” Sparrow Hawk gulped. “I did not know. Well, this changes things.”
“Oh, yes,” Doris said in agreement, “it changes everything.” She directed her attention back to Agnes. “They are twin souls.”
“Indeed, they are. Mirrors of one another. One has a good heart, the other is a two-heart—a person of darkness who’s chosen an evil path to fulfill his needs.” Agnes lifted her head and said proudly, “You should have been at Dana’s birth. Her grandparents were there as well. Everyone was so excited. Because I was there to help with the birth and had been adopted into the family, I assisted in the delivery. When Cora went into the final stages of labor, a thunderstorm came rolling out of the west. I watched from the window as the sky grew black with approaching thunder beings, the spirits who create these powerful storms. Each time Cora cried out, lightning would flash across the sky, followed by a clap of thunder that shook the house like a dog shaking off fleas. And when Dana slid into my hands and took her first breath, a bolt of lightning was hurled by a thunder being. It split the huge cottonwood that grew fifty feet away from their door. I stood with my adopted granddaughter in my hands as the blinding light filled the house, bathing all of us with his radiant presence. Dana did not cry. She did not whimper. As I looked out the window, I saw the cottonwood tree cleave in two and fall over.”
Rubbing her chin, which was sprinkled with white hairs, Sheila One Feather groused, “Well, there you go, Agnes. Even then, the thunder beings were telling you that as Dana was born, another of equal power was being born. It doesn’t matter that the year of birth is different. When two people are born on the same day and month, there is a connection between them. A sacred cottonwood splitting in two means two of something.” Her thick, bushy brows fell. “Now we know who the other one is. Rogan Fast Horse.”
“Yes, yes,” Agnes said, nodding her head. “As I stood there drying Dana off, before handing her to her mother, I didn’t realize what the thunder beings were trying to tell me. It didn’t dawn on me until recently.” She touched her head. “A little slow, this one.”
Laughter again permeated the hogan.
“Rogan was born in Kentucky. Dana was born at the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota,” Kate Little Bird mused. “Otherwise, they are twin souls bound together in a spiral death dance.” Her full lips puckered and she looked around the circle. “Only one will survive their confrontation with one another. We all know that. I have seen other twin souls born, and every time, one of them dies early. Usually in a violent or tragic event. And it may or may not be due to the twin causing the death but they will meet and the Great Spirit will decide who lives and dies after that.”
“It is a battle between the light and darkness,” Doris reminded them. “And no one can foretell the outcome. Dana’s heart must be pure and powerful in faith in order to overcome Rogan’s dark ambitions.”
“She is the daughter of the Blue Heron Society,” Agnes declared. “It is in her blood, in her heart, to help Mother Earth and all her relations.”
“Well,” Sparrow Hawk grumped, “Rogan has plenty of power now. What’s to stop him from using the Storm Pipe again? A ceremonial object used for centuries accrues tremendous power. In the wrong hands, such a pipe could be directed to send a lethal blow. But even a ceremonial pipe must have time to recharge after such a feat. Most take six weeks, at least, after unleashing all their power.”
“True,” Agnes agreed. “I know the Storm Pipe. It will be that long before she can be used again by Rogan.”
“I hate the fact that one of our precious pipes is being misused like this,” Doris muttered. “They are our most powerful ceremonial tools, which is why the choosing of a pipe carrier takes so long. Years of watching a person, gauging
